No More Saturday Morning Cartoons

[cumberlandreds]

The last network to offer Saturday morning cartoons will be dropping them soon. The CW Network was the last. I didn't know they did show cartoons then to be honest. Of course you can still watch cartoons anytime you want on a bunch of 24 hour networks made to just show cartoons.

When I was a kid I lived for Saturday morning cartoons. I would get up before they even came on and would watch the test pattern and farm reports. The cartoons would start around 7 am and go until around noon. This was the only time you could see cartoons, There was no Cartoon Network or Boomerang that air these shows 24/7 in today's world. I also remember that on a Friday night in September CBS would have a preview show of all the new cartoons for the new season which was starting the next day. I think I would be so excited I could hardly sleep that night in anticipation of seeing the new Hong Kong Phooey Show or The Pink Panther or the new season of The Road Runner Show. I would also devour the TV Guide that previewed the new cartoons too. It was all so great and oh so innocent. I'm glad I grew up when I did even if I couldn't watch cartoons except on Saturday mornings.

http://www.wtop.com/546/3713607/The-...rning-cartoons (http://www.wtop.com/546/3713607/The-end-of-Saturday-morning-cartoons)

[westofyou]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vvx7GhLnzdQ


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBVyEPaY9ks



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lPklY_d-m_Q

[cumberlandreds]

^ Thanks, I will watch all of those eventually.

[KronoRed]

No more reason to get up on Saturdays.

[bengalsown]

Now all you have to do is DVR some cartoons and watch them on demand. Our DVR is full of different cartoons for our 3 year old.

Sucks for people who can only afford to watch over the air TV though. Does PBS do saturday morning cartoons? They have some good ones.

[Rojo]

[COLOR=#000000]I would also devour the TV Guide that previewed the new cartoons too. It was all so great and oh so innocent.

Yeah, I remember doing that. I'm a fossil.

[George Anderson]

My brother and i used to take the tv channel guide in the newspaper and circle all the cartoons we were going to watch.

Cartoons today are awful anyway. No explosions or gun shoot outs or anything good. Yet another thing ruined by the pc know it all crowd.

[RedsBaron]

I grew up watching cartoons, including the wonderful Looney Tune efforts with Bugs and Daffy, and the cheaper Hanna-Barbera 'toons with Yogi Bear, et al. Our local NBC channel also had "Mr. Cartoon," a locally produced effort telecast weekdays at 4 p.m. ( I was even on the show once).
When our sons were growing up in the 1990s I did discover a few newer cartoons that I thought were good kid fare, such as Rugrats, but most of what was offered was subpar compared to Bugs Bunny.

[Sea Ray]

My brother and i used to take the tv channel guide in the newspaper and circle all the cartoons we were going to watch.

Cartoons today are awful anyway. No explosions or gun shoot outs or anything good. Yet another thing ruined by the pc know it all crowd.

You nailed it with the PC crowd comment. Some of the best cartoons ever were Tex Avery and there's no way that'd ever fly now. He slammed Mother in Laws, women drivers and Mexicans. You think he would be allowed to do Speedy Gonzales today? Instead we're left with mouthing off kids with runny noses

[Sea Ray]

Now all you have to do is DVR some cartoons and watch them on demand. Our DVR is full of different cartoons for our 3 year old.

Sucks for people who can only afford to watch over the air TV though. Does PBS do saturday morning cartoons? They have some good ones.

PBS definitely has animated kids programming. Just a check of the listings this morning shows PBS has Bob the Builder, Sesame Street and Thomas theTank. If H&R Puff'n'Stuff qualifies then those sure do.

Cartoons are just kinda like MLB...you'll need cable in order to watch it these days. Very few MLB games are on over the air tv these days either

[RedTeamGo!]

I don't know what Rex Avery is but why would we want kids watching something that disrespected women and minorities?

[Sea Ray]

I don't know what Rex Avery is but why would we want kids watching something that disrespected women and minorities?

Tex Avery created characters like Bugs Bunny and many of the cartoons you know so well. The term "what's up Doc" came from his high school where that was the saying of the day much like today they say "s'up" or what's up.

I would disagree that he disrespected anyone. It was all humor or what some around here like to call satire. We have to be able to laugh at ourselves

[redsfanmia]

I think the 24-7 Cartoon Network world is a disservice to the kids of today, there was something about looking forward all week to watch The Superfriends or the Smurfs or Scooby Doo on Saturday mornings. Just sad IMO.

[SunDeck]

I don't know what Rex Avery is but why would we want kids watching something that disrespected women and minorities?

Some of them are pretty awful in this decade, but we let our kids watch them and we have discussions about the context. Children are smarter than most people give them credit for.

[westofyou]

Avery was a genius, some of his content has changed in the ensuing years.

It has as much to do with liberals as it does with the age old adage of "do on to others"

Everything changes, process it, deal with it, live with it.

[Chip R]

If kids were still watching cartoons on Saturday mornings, they would still be on. Let's face it, all the creative animation is in the evenings. There's animation for kids on all day during the week. If kids want to watch them on Saturday mornings, DVR them during the week and have them watch it on Saturdays.

[redsfanmia]

M
Avery was a genius, some of his content has changed in the ensuing years.

It has as much to do with liberals as it does with the age old adage of "do on to others"

Everything changes, process it, deal with it, live with it.
I remember watching the Bugs Bunny cartoon entitled Lets nip the Nips, it was WWII and bugs was handing out bombs dropping derogatory names the the Japanese.

Hopefully this doesn't offend anyone.

[westofyou]

M
I remember watching the Bugs Bunny cartoon entitled Lets nip the Nips, it was WWII and bugs was handing out bombs dropping derogatory names the the Japanese.

Hopefully this doesn't offend anyone.

When? That hasn't been on kids tv since the 50s, maybe a documentary or something

I've seen those and some others in film school the whole era was ripe with racial stereotyping and those were by far the most aggressive ones

[KittyDuran]

When? That hasn't been on kids tv since the 50s, maybe a documentary or something

I've seen those and some others in film school the whole era was ripe with racial stereotyping and those were by far the most aggressive onesI know the cartoons since I still have them on VHS tapes - never seen them on TV. The two VHS tapes are:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bugs_%26_Daffy:_The_Wartime_Cartoons and
http://www.amazon.com/Cartoons-At-War-Animated-Characters/dp/B000MC6JM4 This one has "Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips", as well as "Tokyo Jokio" and "Coal Black and de Sebben Dwarfs". The quality of the tape is very poor to begin with.

[*BaseClogger*]

:laugh:

[KittyDuran]

I don't know what Rex Avery is but why would we want kids watching something that disrespected women and minorities?
You have to take it in terms of when they were made - acceptable today? of course not! Also a lot of the old Warner Bros and MGM cartoons were placed before movies in theaters and had to cater not only to kids but to adults as well. My Dad would watch the cartoons with us on Saturday mornings if he wasn't working - but he would sometimes laugh at the wrong time. Or so I thought. When I got older I realized he was laughing not only at an era reference but at the adult humor that went over our young heads.

On the same note: I was lucky to have purchased Warner Bros and MGM VHS tapes made available in the 80s/90s before they were edited-a great store in the old Forest Fair Mall called Cartoon Corner. Some of the editing I could accept - the most common edit was the "suicide" gag where a character usually uttering the line "Now I've seen everything" shots himself in the head. Other edits were of drug use (mostly pill popping). Two cartoons where the editing cut out the flow where 1) "The Big Snooze" with Bugs and Elmer (Elmer goes to sleep and to enter his dreams Bugs takes sleeping pills "Take deze and doze"). The edited version has Bugs just falling into a deep sleep w/o help. 2) "Hopalong Casualty" with the Roadrunner and the Coyote (Coyote orders, from ACME of course, earthquake pills which the Roadrunner eats them and nothing happens. Coyote eats one...nothing, then in frustration downs the whole bottle.. nothing-yet. As he throws the bottle away, his eyes follow the small print "Caution - not effective on roadrunners", then his body goes into convulsions). Edited version shows only his body convulsing-no pill taking at all.

[Sea Ray]

here's an excellent article about the very thing we're discussing. We live in an age where Amazon has to put a disclaimer on the Tom & Jerry videos they're selling:


So while Amazon has recently added “Tom and Jerry” to its video streaming service, they made sure to include a racism disclaimer: a warning that “Tom and Jerry” contains “some ethnic and racial prejudices that were once commonplace in American society.”

Characters like Mammy Two Shoes “were wrong then and are wrong today,” the warning reads, incensing some fans of the seven-time Academy-Award winning show. “I loved Tom and Jerry as a kid and it never made me think poorly of ethnic minorities or want to smoke cigars,” one tweeted. Another “watched Tom and Jerry since the 60s this is the 1st time I’ve ever heard the R word in relation to it. PC madness!”

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/10/02/is-tom-and-jerry-really-racist.html

And it's not just racial and sexism stuff. 8 yrs ago Turner Broadcasting made a point of editing out all the scenes where smoking is glamorized in these cartoons. That's equally appalling as PC madness:



Turner Broadcasting is scouring more than 1,500 classic Hanna-Barbera cartoons, including old favorites Tom and Jerry, The Flintstones, and Scooby-Doo, to edit out scenes that glamorize smoking.

http://www.tv.com/news/smoking-cuts-for-classic-cartoons-5948/

So they're editing stuff like this from those old classic cartoons and yet we're left with the stuff we get from Family Guy and South Park. How is that OK?

[*BaseClogger*]

:laugh:

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Since when did Tom & Jerry and South Park have the same audience?

[Rojo]

I like Speedy Gonzalez, he's a Bolshevik, always taking cheese from the capitalist pig factory and handing it out to the peasants. Viva, Speedy!

[redsfanmia]

When? That hasn't been on kids tv since the 50s, maybe a documentary or something

I've seen those and some others in film school the whole era was ripe with racial stereotyping and those were by far the most aggressive ones

Maybe it was a documentary, I know I have seen it.

[cumberlandreds]

Maybe it was a documentary, I know I have seen it.

You may have seen them on You Tube. They are there now.

[19braves77]

1985 had to be the best year for Saturday Cartoons if you were a male. My schedule usually went like this:

Bugs Bunny/Looney Tunes Comedy Hour- 8AM
Ewoks- 9:AM
Droids The Adventures of R2-D2 and C3PO while watching Smurfs during commercials. 9:30am
Hulk Hogan's Rock 'n' Wrestling! 10:00am
and the morning was concluded with Alvin and Chipmunks until 10:30am

[KittyDuran]

You may have seen them on You Tube. They are there now.

Check out the SNAFU cartoons that Warner Bros made for the military during WWII. But keep in mind the audience that was watching them.

[Revering4Blue]

Schedules and program profiles for every series the networks broadcast on Saturday Mornings from the mid-Sixties all through the Seventies and into the eighties.

http://tvparty.com/sat.html

A trip down memory lane.

[westofyou]

1985 had to be the best year for Saturday Cartoons if you were a male. My schedule usually went like this:

Bugs Bunny/Looney Tunes Comedy Hour- 8AM
Ewoks- 9:AM
Droids The Adventures of R2-D2 and C3PO while watching Smurfs during commercials. 9:30am
Hulk Hogan's Rock 'n' Wrestling! 10:00am
and the morning was concluded with Alvin and Chipmunks until 10:30am
http://www.tvparty.com/sat69.html

[Sea Ray]

:laugh:

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Since when did Tom & Jerry and South Park have the same audience?

You may think it's all about the audience but I don't think so. I don't think even South Park would be allowed to have a character like Mammy Two Shoes.

[cumberlandreds]

http://tvparty.com/sat.html

A trip down memory lane.

Really good site! I am going to have to go and look at the years that were the prime of my youth. One thing I remember was that a station we received from Bristol, Va would show some cartoons on Sunday mornings. That's when I would watch the Jetsons and Underdog before going to church.

[*BaseClogger*]

You may think it's all about the audience but I don't think so. I don't think even South Park would be allowed to have a character like Mammy Two Shoes.

You're coming off like the guys complaining that their first amendment rights aren't being protected because everybody judges them when they throw around ethnic slurs...

[George Anderson]

You're coming off like the guys

Sexism much??

[*BaseClogger*]

Sexism much??

You got me!

8011

[Rojo]

One thing I remember was that a station we received from Bristol, Va would show some cartoons on Sunday mornings.

I was always bummed by Sunday morning. There was nothing except the occasional Davey & Goliath.

[cumberlandreds]

I was always bummed by Sunday morning. There was nothing except the occasional Davey & Goliath.

I never got that cartoon. My wife mentioned it to me a few years back and told her that I never heard of it. We then actually found it on one of the religious channels we were getting at the time. It was OK. Good clean family stuff.

[Yachtzee]

http://tvparty.com/sat.html

A trip down memory lane.

Thanks. I just wasted so much time going through all those years. My prime Saturday morning viewing years were the mid 1970s to early 1980s, but I've pretty much seen most of the shows from the 1960s-70s through syndication. There was UHF channel that would show most of those shows and syndicated prime time shows after school for us latchkey kids. My earliest memories of Saturday Morning were the classic Superfriends and Looney Tunes, as well as shows such as Emergency! +4, the Hudson Brothers Razzle Dazzle Hour, Land of the Lost, the Krofft Super Show, Far Out Space Nuts, Hong Kong Phooey, and every year Hanna-Barbera would come out with some new, weird, cheaply animated show that was basically a rehash of some other show that I would just eat up. By '80-'81, I had gotten to the point where I felt most of the Saturday Morning Cartoons were lame (but my younger brother and sister loved them). At that point, I was just biding my time going through the box scores in the Saturday Morning paper, waiting for the Baseball Bunch and This Week in Baseball to come on before the Saturday MLB Game of the Week on NBC.

[Revering4Blue]

Thanks. I just wasted so much time going through all those years. My prime Saturday morning viewing years were the mid 1970s to early 1980s, but I've pretty much seen most of the shows from the 1960s-70s through syndication. There was UHF channel that would show most of those shows and syndicated prime time shows after school for us latchkey kids. My earliest memories of Saturday Morning were the classic Superfriends and Looney Tunes, as well as shows such as Emergency! +4, the Hudson Brothers Razzle Dazzle Hour, Land of the Lost, the Krofft Super Show, Far Out Space Nuts, Hong Kong Phooey, and every year Hanna-Barbera would come out with some new, weird, cheaply animated show that was basically a rehash of some other show that I would just eat up. By '80-'81, I had gotten to the point where I felt most of the Saturday Morning Cartoons were lame (but my younger brother and sister loved them). At that point, I was just biding my time going through the box scores in the Saturday Morning paper, waiting for the Baseball Bunch and This Week in Baseball to come on before the Saturday MLB Game of the Week on NBC.

Your Saturday Morning viewing habits mirrored mine. Looking back, I'm amazed that I was actually able to stay up as late as I possibly could on Friday Nights, while mustering up enough energy to wake up at the crack of dawn on Saturday Mornings around 6 or so to watch syndicated reruns -- Gilligan's Island and the like -- before the cartoons were on. Of course, by 7th grad or so, the lack of energy began to take it's toll on me and I began to sleep in.

Speaking of the Superfriends, a little known tidbit of trivia: The original voice of "Meanwhile, at The Hall Of Justice" was none other than the late Ted Knight.

[cumberlandreds]

http://tvparty.com/sat.html

A trip down memory lane.

I went back and looked at the years that were probably my prime viewing years. Looked like from 1968 to about 1975 was what I remembered best. In the area I lived in I couldn't get an ABC channel until early 1975 when my dad finally signed up for cable. So I missed out on the ABC cartoons up until that point. After 1975 I really couldn't remember the cartoons. So by 1976 I was probably sleeping late on Saturdays and most likely felt I was too old for cartoons.

[westofyou]

I never got that cartoon. My wife mentioned it to me a few years back and told her that I never heard of it. We then actually found it on one of the religious channels we were getting at the time. It was OK. Good clean family stuff.

I have the box set on DVD, it's kitschy and cracks me up, done by Art Clokey (Gumby)

[cumberlandreds]

I have the box set on DVD, it's kitschy and cracks me up, done by Art Clokey (Gumby)

That figures. It seems very Gumby like. :)

[Yachtzee]

Your Saturday Morning viewing habits mirrored mine. Looking back, I'm amazed that I was actually able to stay up as late as I possibly could on Friday Nights, while mustering up enough energy to wake up at the crack of dawn on Saturday Mornings around 6 or so to watch syndicated reruns -- Gilligan's Island and the like -- before the cartoons were on. Of course, by 7th grad or so, the lack of energy began to take it's toll on me and I began to sleep in.

Speaking of the Superfriends, a little known tidbit of trivia: The original voice of "Meanwhile, at The Hall Of Justice" was none other than the late Ted Knight.

I heard that about Ted Knight. My friend got the Superfriends on DVD for his kids and it was amazing how poorly done the animation was on those shows. Much of the show features the same stock backgrounds, characters are painted using as few colors as possible (characters don't even have white eyeballs. All faces are painted a flat fleshtone color), and movement is very limited.

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I have the box set on DVD, it's kitschy and cracks me up, done by Art Clokey (Gumby)

Oh Davey!

[dougdirt]

You may think it's all about the audience but I don't think so. I don't think even South Park would be allowed to have a character like Mammy Two Shoes.

I honestly have no idea about that character, but for what, 15 years now, Cartman has been making fun of Kyle for being Jewish with all kinds of the various stereotypes in his insults. They've blasted Canadians since the beginning. Have you ever watched South Park?

[*BaseClogger*]

I honestly have no idea about that character, but for what, 15 years now, Cartman has been making fun of Kyle for being Jewish with all kinds of the various stereotypes in his insults. They've blasted Canadians since the beginning. Have you ever watched South Park?

They've shown a cartoon depiction of Muhammad! (Or wait was that Family Guy?) :laugh:

[GAC]

The last network to offer Saturday morning cartoons will be dropping them soon. The CW Network was the last. I didn't know they did show cartoons then to be honest. Of course you can still watch cartoons anytime you want on a bunch of 24 hour networks made to just show cartoons.

When I was a kid I lived for Saturday morning cartoons. I would get up before they even came on and would watch the test pattern and farm reports. The cartoons would start around 7 am and go until around noon. This was the only time you could see cartoons, There was no Cartoon Network or Boomerang that air these shows 24/7 in today's world. I also remember that on a Friday night in September CBS would have a preview show of all the new cartoons for the new season which was starting the next day. I think I would be so excited I could hardly sleep that night in anticipation of seeing the new Hong Kong Phooey Show or The Pink Panther or the new season of The Road Runner Show. I would also devour the TV Guide that previewed the new cartoons too. It was all so great and oh so innocent. I'm glad I grew up when I did even if I couldn't watch cartoons except on Saturday mornings.

http://www.wtop.com/546/3713607/The-...rning-cartoons (http://www.wtop.com/546/3713607/The-end-of-Saturday-morning-cartoons)

I don't know how old you are buddy, I'm in my late 50's, but after reading the above, you described me and my brothers to a tee growing up. We did exactly the same. As a child growing up in the late 50s, and into the 60s, you LIVED for Saturday morning cartoons. Of course back then you only had VHF/UHF channels (7-8 total?); but we were up around 5;30 Am, lying on the floor in your pajamas, watching that test pattern, waiting for one of those channels to start showing cartoons. And you didn't move till around noon (LOL).

Friz Freleng, Tex Avery, Bob Clampett, Chuck Jones, and Bob McKimson were simply geniuses of the Golden Age of Animation. And I would also add Max and Dave Fleischer (Popeye), as well as Walter Lantz (Woody Woodpecker), Terrytoons (Paul Terry), Famous Studios (Harveytoons), and of course Jay Ward (Bullwinkle). I remember many of the comedians back then were somewhat worried about the competition from the growing popularity cartoons because you can do things in animation that they can't do in real life.

And one of my many idols growing up was voice actor Mel Blanc. He was the master. Nobody can touch him. Growing up I taught myself how to do many of the character's voices he did. I was on the golf course last week and did Pete Puma, and my brother started laughing so hard it took him a bit to compose himself so he could hit (LOL).

As for today's "PC crowd" that criticizes those old cartoons from the 40's/50's because of racial stereotypes, sexism, or even violence? Yeah, it existed, and some examples have already been sighted. Big deal! Get a life is all I can say. Back in the mid-70s, one of the female CEOs (I think it was ABC) decided to edit out all the violence in Warner Brothers cartoons ... the coyote falling off the cliff, Elmer Fudd shooting someone, etc. "Wabbitt Season, Duck Season" where Daffy keeps getting shot by Elmer, just doesn't make it with that edited out.

The original Popeye cartoons were not only violent, but he cursed under his breath.

Cartoons back then weren't created for children, but were shorts shown in movie theaters for adult audiences.

I don't see how anyone can complain about them, yet allowed their kids to watch Beavis and Butthead, Rem & Stempy, or even today's Family Guy. AS well as the extreme violence in video games.

Watching Elmer Fudd shoot Daffy was tame.

[cumberlandreds]

^ I'm 51 GAC. So we are of the same time period. It was a fun time. I wouldn't trade those days for anything.

[westofyou]

^ I'm 51 GAC. So we are of the same time period. It was a fun time. I wouldn't trade those days for anything.

Come to the Honeycomb Hideout

[Sea Ray]

I honestly have no idea about that character, but for what, 15 years now, Cartman has been making fun of Kyle for being Jewish with all kinds of the various stereotypes in his insults. They've blasted Canadians since the beginning. Have you ever watched South Park?

Definitely which is why I said it's nuts that South Park can do what it does but a show like the Flintstones can't be shown now about making fun of mother in laws or the Jetsons who dedicated a show to the perils of women drivers

[Sea Ray]

Since when did Tom & Jerry and South Park have the same audience?



IAs for today's "PC crowd" that criticizes those old cartoons from the 40's/50's because of racial stereotypes, sexism, or even violence? Yeah, it existed, and some examples have already been sighted. Big deal! Get a life is all I can say. Back in the mid-70s, one of the female CEOs (I think it was ABC) decided to edit out all the violence in Warner Brothers cartoons ... the coyote falling off the cliff, Elmer Fudd shooting someone, etc. "Wabbitt Season, Duck Season" where Daffy keeps getting shot by Elmer, just doesn't make it with that edited out.

The original Popeye cartoons were not only violent, but he cursed under his breath.

Cartoons back then weren't created for children, but were shorts shown in movie theaters for adult audiences.

I don't see how anyone can complain about them, yet allowed their kids to watch Beavis and Butthead, Rem & Stempy, or even today's Family Guy. AS well as the extreme violence in video games.

Watching Elmer Fudd shoot Daffy was tame.

Exactly right...

[*BaseClogger*]

Are the Looney Tunes meant to be satirical like South Park? (honest question)

[OldRightHander]

I heard that about Ted Knight. My friend got the Superfriends on DVD for his kids and it was amazing how poorly done the animation was on those shows. Much of the show features the same stock backgrounds, characters are painted using as few colors as possible (characters don't even have white eyeballs. All faces are painted a flat fleshtone color), and movement is very limited.

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Oh Davey!

I probably wasn't the only kid who expected to see Superman flying out of the Union Terminal.

[fearofpopvol1]

I have fond memories of being a kid and staying up late because it was Friday but somehow trying to wake up early to watch cartoons on Saturday morning. I was bummed when I would oversleep and miss some of the best ones. It seemed like 8-10am was the perfect window.

If this somehow forced kids to read more and get out more I'd be all for it but I'm not holding my breath on that.

[Sea Ray]

Are the Looney Tunes meant to be satirical like South Park? (honest question)

I would certainly say yes

[Dom Heffner]

Are the Looney Tunes meant to be satirical like South Park? (honest question)

Bingo.

South Park is satire, the cartoons of old reflected actual stereotypes.